Come Fly With Us

On the Wharton-WIEF episode this is what I wrote a few days ago: “One of the things about USA that I admire is that they consider even one American being attacked as an act against the country. Reprisal is assured. Any American attacked anywhere in the world is taken very seriously by the US govt. In contrast, the Indian GOI values Indian lives very casually”. The anti-national elements thrill and cheer when an Indian is “snubbed” by other countries or institutes abroad because of their political ideologies. To the Congress and the Communists India or Indians never came first. So it’s hardly surprising that Italy has now refused to return the two Marines charged with two fishermen off the coast of Kerala. I don’t blame the Italians one bit. On the contrary I applaud their govt for standing by their citizens' right through the whole incident and events after.

It’s funny to think Ram Singh, the accused in the Delhi Gangrape case, decided to commit suicide in Tihar jail. And though there isn’t a final confirmation if it was suicide or murder Ram Singh could have used some innovative excuses. He could have asked to visit his wife or family for Holi or Shivratri and then disappeared. After all, another rape-accused, Bitty Mohanty, did jump parole and disappear for seven years. Till a few months back Durai Dayanidhi, son of a top politician and accused in the granite scam in Tamil Nadu, was absconding for many months till a court allowed him bail. In the Gopal Kanda case (Geetika Sharma suicide) another accused, Chanshivroop Singh has jumped bail and fled to the US. The sob story can go on and on.

In the famous murder case of Gulshan Kumar of T-Series tapes the Mumbai police had named musician Nadeem (of Nadeem-Shravan fame) as a suspect while he was abroad. Nadeem, who was in the UK then, decided never to come back to India and face trial and still lives in the UK. You would think it is quite silly of the police who want to nab a suspect but would announce his name so he can happily stay away from interrogation or trial. Any sensible Police unit would have stayed quiet till the suspect returned and then announced and arrested him. Nadeem, on learning he was named a suspect, stayed on in the UK and his asylum case went right up to the House of Lords who refused to extradite him. Back then the House of Lords was like a Supreme Court and the UK now has a separate Supreme Court. The rule for Indian police is to first be foolish and then play out a long-drawn extradition exercise. It’s a very repetitive story, isn’t it?

Other countries make it extremely difficult for us to get a criminal back to India for a trial. And I’m talking about an “Indian” criminal not a Honduran or a foreigner from Burkina Faso. But what happens if there is a rare case of someone being actually extradited? Remember Abu Salem? His wife was hired for Reality shows. Salem himself wanted to contest elections from Azamgarh (he would have won too). The Portuguese even demanded that Salem be returned for improper treatment of the accused. The late Jagjit Singh Chauhan, master-mind of the Khalistan terror movement was given asylum abroad. And our media never forgets to do favours to those absconding. MF Hussain who was wanted by Indian courts absconded and finally went into exile and died. The Indian media hailed him as a hero who was hounded out. No matter what the cause, a person running from Indian courts is a fugitive and must be treated as such. Media glorifies criminals and fugitives.

Lalit K Modi, the former IPL boss, is wanted in India for questioning. He is happily in the UK and frequently appears on TV shows as a panellist. Really nice! How did we get here? Firstly, it wouldn’t be wrong to say our govt has turned this into a Banana republic that many have chosen to call it. The Italian Marines were first sent home for Christmas and returned. They were allowed to go home again to vote. To vote? How absurd can this get? Most Armed-forces personnel are allowed to vote through post from where ever they are located. This could have been considered for the Italians too but no our govt wanted to be generous.

It now raises the suspicion why the Italians backed out. Of course, I maintain that I applaud the Italian govt for standing up for their Marines. They had disputed the legality of the shooting incident right from the start. It’s the Indian govt that has shamed itself and the nation. There will be whispers and then a general connection made that there may have been some backdoor deals with the Italians. This comes at a time when the Italians are investigating the Agusta Westland Chopper scam and many inconvenient names from India may have popped out. So is this a deal with the Italians to protect such names? Time will tell (or maybe time will bury this scam too).

What we do know is that far from being a super-power or any close to it, we have truly become the laughing stock of the world. When it’s terror we play “dossier-dossier” with Pakistan. I’m convinced we will do the same with Italy as we have been doing with Pakistan, with the Bofors players, with Nadeem and many such cases. The Indian govt has a permanent label on its head “come fly with us”.

PS: On a different note, I had a chat with Prasanna Vishwanathan of CRI last week. Those who didn’t get the link through Twitter/FB can hear it on Youtube.
 

Wharton & The Anti-Nationals

Here’s a simple test for you. Name five Chinese brands across all categories of products. Got you thinking? Alright, let’s make it simpler. Name five American brands. I’m sure by the time I finish the next sentence you have already managed to reel off 10 American brand names. America wins. Oh yeah! What misses most of us is that each nation has a specialisation. The Chinese have come to wield enormous economic influence as a manufacturing nation not as a marketing nation. In contrast, USA has moved from a manufacturing giant to a marketing giant. There are many good things about American culture that we can borrow. But we always happen to borrow the worst things.

You see, while evil is easy to replicate; the good bits are hard to emulate. Considering the influence the Islamists and Commies have on our establishment it is unlikely you will ever have a First Amendment type law in India allowing absolute free speech. But we will happily import idiotic ideas like the worst of Hollywood movies and remake them in Bollywood. We will import silly stuff like Valentine’s Day which is a Greeting Card brand’s delight. Most American adults live separately from parents. So they have Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and have to spare a day each year to remember them. In India, even though most care for our parents all the time, we import such nonsense. Even so, all these imports aren’t harmful in anyway. There was a time when Madison Avenue creative geniuses would be recognised by their shoddy dress, unkempt beard and, most of all, a pony tail. Madison Avenue may have given up on that crap but our local geniuses now sport such creative identities. See what I mean?

Ah well, I had to chop off the face of one of them just in case he decides to sue me for defamation for using his face. We import and copy the worst of America while our establishment is incapable of borrowing the best from their culture. This is even more difficult when there are commies and anti-nationals floating as spokies for India. It is in this context that I view the “Ban Narendra Modi From Speaking At Wharton” campaign by certain Commies and Anti-nationals. Their names seem to ring a familiar tone: Ania Loomba, Suvir Kaul, Toorjo Ghosh, Shabnam Hashmi and sponsors like TV18 and even the GOI campaign of “Incredible India”. How nice! A GOI campaign supports an event that succumbs to a campaign that suppresses the voice of an Indian. And he happens to be a four-time elected Chief Minister of a state of India.

The moment USA announced Narendra Modi would not be welcome to USA or Wharton decided to withdraw his keynote address, the GOI should have cancelled all support to the event. But no, our GOI, mainly the Congress, delights in “snub” to Modi as much as the commies. Sometime back our media and commies celebrated the cancellation of summer courses of Subramanian Swamy at Harvard because of his hard-hitting article on Terrorism. Back then, commies like NDTV and CNN-IBN celebrated that moment as a “snub”.

One of the things about USA that I admire is that they consider even one American being attacked as an act against the country. Reprisal is assured. Any American attacked anywhere in the world is taken very seriously by the US govt. In contrast, the Indian GOI values Indian lives very casually It’s because the Americans shed their blood and sacrificed their lives for their freedom. Maybe we got it relatively easily. On their independence, the Americans charted their own course with their own Constitution. We did not. We just copied the operations of a tiny state called Britain.  

In the movie “Gandhi” in a scene the British Viceroy asks Gandhi “but India is a country of Hindus, Muslims, castes .. how will you handle all that?”.. And Gandhi replies: “Whatever it is, those are our problems, we will handle it our way”. Is it so? Is this what Gandhiji meant “our problems”? Regardless of what happened in Gujarat or whatever it is about Narendra Modi that should have been OUR problem. But commie NGOs, the Congress and many news channels think some institutes in the USA should interfere in OUR problems. This is the most shameful outcome of what is happening in India. Our govt and groups of commies have allowed our problems to be judged by institutions in the US. And if you need proof of how much hate our journos have for Indians this tweet by Praveen SR should tell you. He’s obviously a big fan of Hugo Chavez but what makes him want MMS or Modi to have died instead of Chavez? That’s the kind of anti-nationals floating among us.

If a ship were sinking, like the Titanic, who would Jack save first? Would he save Rose or some stranger from the Inkatha tribe? If you and I were in the same boat who would I save first? An Indian or some guy from Wharton? But no, for some commies and anti-nationals, Indians come last. They rejoice in Indians sinking merely because of their political ideologies. They would rather save Attila The Hun than save some Indian who doesn’t speak English very well. This is the worst import we made from the West. And Javed Akhtar and Shabana Azmi are going to speak about “Media and social change”. The Indian media like NDTV and CNN-IBN are among those that rejoice the “snubs” to the likes of Swamy and Modi. Are they Indians? Is the GOI Indian? To me, all those who campaigned with Wharton are nothing more than “Anti-nationals”. Someday, I hope they pay a price for having learned nothing good from the US. They live there and berate Indians all the time.

The Americans have marketed their institutions well. They have created bootlickers and slaves in India who will buy anything they sell. China is now a super-power because they showed the Americans their place. India, despite all talks of independence will not be a superpower as long as the establishment looks down upon Indians where other nations are concerned. We have produced fewer patriots and more anti-nationals.